Harry Cunningham (1891–1938) was an early 20th century Irish-American activist. He held executive positions in several New York-based Irish-American cultural and political organizations, many of which were focused on mobilizing materiel support to the fight for an independent Irish republic. He was a close friend and confidant of John Devoy, long-time leader of the Clan-na-Gael organization, especially in Devoy’s later years as his health declined. Though active in many aspects of early 20th century New York Irish-American life, Cunningham is best known for saving John Holland’s Fenian Ram, the world’s first functioning submarine and symbol of Irish-American ingenuity, from destruction in 1927.

Harry Cunningham was born Henry Conaghan in 1891 in Montcharles, County Donegal, Ireland, to farmers John and Winifred Campbell Conaghan. As a young man, he anglicized his name to Cunningham. In 1909, he departed for the United States and settled in New York City; first in Manhattan, later in the Bronx. He became a naturalized US citizen in 1914.

A successor to the 19th century Fenian Brotherhood, the Clan-na-Gael (Family of the Gaels) was a quasi-clandestine Irish republican organization that operated as a US-based adjunct to the Ireland-based underground Irish Republican Brotherhood. Led by John Devoy, Clan-na-Gael orchestrated a wide range of schemes and programs designed to aid the Irish republican cause from across the ocean. The date of Cunningham’s affiliation is not known. Nevertheless, he quickly developed a close rapport with Devoy—according to a press account; “he never failed in any task assigned to him by Mr. Devoy, regardless of the personal risk or the intelligence required to complete it successfully”.

Cunningham served on the National Council of the Friends of Irish Freedom, and also held the post of national solicitor for the organization. Established in 1916 in the months prior to the Easter Rising, the FOIF was a large-scale, overt advocacy group designed to propagandize on behalf of Irish independence, and marshal the resources of the sizeable Irish-American population for the fight against British rule in Ireland. In 1919, when Irish provisional government Finance Minister Michael Collins developed the “Dáil bonds” program to raise money for the administration, FOIF mobilized over $5 million in American investment. Devoy’s Clan-na-Gael dominated FOIF executive positions.

The August 1922 assassination of Michael Collins during the Irish Civil War was a shock to the Irish-American community. Cunningham, speaking in part on behalf of the FOIF, offered the following statement to the New York Tribune:

The real friends of Ireland deplore the irreparable loss she has suffered in the slaying of Michael Collins, the fearless, courageous leader of the Irish people. Only madmen could have been guilty of such an outrage which has shocked the entire civilized world. But the cause for which Collins was fighting will live.

During the Irish Civil War, the Devoy-led organizations in the United States supported the Irish Free State government over the Anti-Treaty forces led by Eamon de Valera. Once the war ended, Devoy was invited to tour Ireland as the invited guest of President William T. Cosgrave. Cunningham served as Devoy’s personal escort throughout the 6-week tour, meeting with senior government officials and other notable personalities - among them Foreign Minister Desmond Fitzgerald and Mrs. Mary Collins Powell, sister of the deceased Michael Collins, who greeted them upon arrival in Cobh, Cork.

Cunningham was keen on preserving artifacts of the Irish-American experience. The Fenian Ram was an experimental submarine designed and built by Irish immigrant inventor John P. Holland. John Devoy and the Clan-na-Gael financed its construction in 1879-80, with the idea that it would sink British shipping during a future Irish uprising. The vessel never saw combat and ultimately became an exhibit on the campus of Clason Point Military Academy, Bronx, NY. On May 27, 1927, the Academy, preparing to move its campus to Long Island, sold the hull to a junk dealer for $100.